


Time Unlimited

by slightlyjillian



Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gods, Bromance, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, Mythology - Freeform, Timey-Wimey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-19
Updated: 2010-09-19
Packaged: 2017-10-12 00:25:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/118793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slightlyjillian/pseuds/slightlyjillian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Original Myth AU. Given enough <i>time</i>, even the gods cannot escape their affections for the mortal world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time Unlimited

The fire warmed room smelled rich with spiced wine. The winter wind only occasionally howled more loudly than the cheerful company of men inside. They wore heavy, matted furs over their uniforms and their shoes were threadbare from the long journey they marched under their commander.

The hired girls enjoyed the attention of the soldiers, new company that showered them with admiring attentions rather than the prejudices of the local community.

One man had kept quiet behind his sad smiles. He sat in the corner and watched their faces as if looking for someone familiar. But no one knew who he was, or his name. The tavern staff assumed he was an officer. And the soldiers believed he was a simple traveler, like them.

Soon, the crowd thinned. The men went back to their beds and tents. The girls washed dishes and wiped down the old tables. As the last of the wood snapped and burned red, the hired minstrel continued to play. Those who stayed late listened to him sing. Those in love, heard romance. Those who were weary, heard rest.

The stranger in the corner finished his drink and gave a long, heavy sigh. He never found who he was looking for in the crowds. But that was the curse of the gods.

***

"When the godlings found our world, they inhabited the places that had been created," the philosopher told the well-known story to a gathering of students. The younger men and women sat around him as he lectured long into the afternoon. "One lived in the sky. Two went into the sea. Four stayed on the land. Five retreated to the underworld. But Three did not choose and watched as his brothers entangled their power and identity into their new homes.

"Three visited his powerful kin as a guest in their kingdoms. One took him on several journey's through the stars. Two entertained him with the acrobatics of the seas. Four sheltered him in the open, warm deserts or the shaded, cool forests. With Five, he quietly enjoyed the motionless silence of the dead.

"During his time in the stillness, Three walked the trail of the dead and lingered to look at the face of the mortal men and women. He knew the thoughts and deeds of their lives and the judgment thereof. He learned of injustice and cruelty and such ill deeds. He also saw pictures of joy and fleeting happiness as men could share with one another."

The philosopher continued with his story by adding his own reflections and insights. He questioned his students and encouraged debate. Each class of students eventually circled around the oldest question of them all.

He lifted his forked eyebrow when a surly boy in the back raised his hand. Nichol had said nothing during the lecture. The dark-headed youth seldom engaged with his peers, but the frowning of his brow and the angry flush on his cheeks had been brewing some conclusion to the material of their classes.

"Yes, Nichol?"

"Did Three end up being the god of _anything_?"

And there it was. The other students considered the idea only briefly before offering their own suggestions founded in legend, rumor and bedside stories. But Nichol sat back on his hands, his gaze drifting into the distance.

***

The student lodgings were communal, so when Nichol walked into the room for some rest he quickly turned back around. He would get no sleep if Milliardo and Lucrezia were skipping lectures for the afternoon. Nichol rubbed his eyes to block out the image of uncovered, long white limbs. He heard his name and then the brief laughter of his peers when they admitted his brief intrusion.

"Don't be so shy, little Nicky," Lucrezia's voice went shrill at the last. Nichol hastened away.

The midday light dulled under the thick cloud cover. He'd expected a rain to break, but only the chill wind of promise filled the atmosphere. Finding shelter in one of the man-made gardens, Nichol sat down to doze under a blossoming tree.

Lightning flashed across the gray sky. Briefly opening his eyes, the light showed that he was being observed.

"Who?" Nichol started to push up his legs, until the stranger held out an open palm. A misting rain fell around the tree.

"May I join you?" the stranger asked.

Shrugging, Nichol unnecessarily moved to the side as if making room by the open tree. He somewhat noticed the person sitting at his side and returned to sleep.

***

"Something to represent the gods," Nichol fussed from his workbench in the sculpting room. All around him, the other students concentrated on making something that would set them above their peers and impress their instructor.

Milliardo and Lucrezia shared his space, but they kept their heads close together and whispered over their developing artwork. Appropriately, it had the basic shape of an intimate union, which was a popular theory but made to seem somewhat less when Lucy kept struggling to hide her giggling.

"Are you going to begin?" Une startled him from his indulgent frowning. Juxtaposed with the interaction of Lucrezia and Milliardo, Nichol swallowed hard under her gaze. He'd been skeptical of the fairer sex until he'd met her almost militant approach of creative academics.

He found his voice long enough to say, "Does one rush inspirations?"

She liked him, he was certain, and her narrowing eyes might have conveyed what she offered as affection. "Carry on," she instructed. Then gave a scowl at the couple who ignored her completely. She briskly carried herself to the next table. Arms behind her back, she inspected the next student's work.

As if he'd passed the only test that mattered to him, Nichol experienced a rush of clear thinking. His hands worked the grey material as if he had the authority to make life with his own power. Time stopped measuring itself as he worked, when at last he took what might have been his first breath.

As if waking from a dream, Nichol considered the imperfect shape of a tree. Underneath the rudimentary branches was a smaller figure, but he knew it to be a man.

He saw Une moving around the room again. He couldn't explain this… mystery. Before he could reconsider, he hid the creation with a deconstructive squeezing of his fists leaving everything as shapeless as it had been before.

***

"We are not allowed to have favorites," Wufei said, finding Trowa walking the long hallway of his kingdom. Each wall was a pattern of glass doors and candle-lit lanterns in-between. Beyond the glass was the body of the dead typically surrounded by the darkness of eternal sleep.

Trowa had pressed his hand against a panel and a brilliant light illuminated from within.

"Yet, I find you lingering here, in this place… too often," the god of the underworld warned. "Even Quatre knows better and he is most attached to the mortals that live under his protection."

"Yes, well…" Trowa drew his hand back and the light faded slowly back into black. "That might be Heero's concept of what is best, but have you asked Duo about his beloved sailors? He goes on as much as Quatre."

"I think they have a better understanding of mortality," Wufei's tone remained unsympathetically dry. "Humanity, these creatures that populate our world, are best lived when those lives are brief, beautiful moments."

"Well put, god of the dead," Trowa chuckled. "But I shouldn't say that in case Duo remembers his old quarrel with you."

"Heero knew what he was doing when he gave me the solitary watch." Wufei led them away from the place Trowa liked to linger. "Duo would cause more mischief than you if he had the worshipers of death."

"I do not cause mischief," Trowa objected.

"Then why do I find you trespassing here, again and again, in this place?"

"Our omniscience is not perfect," Trowa suggested. "But I sense a new era in our future… one I cannot explain on my own."

"You won't find your answer among the mortals," Wufei argued. "Let alone that one. I have seen his life, and it was nothing but misguided loyalty and perpetuating betrayal."

"If he had had _time_ ," Trowa started, somewhat wistfully, before thinking better of his audience and kept quiet the remaining thoughts, which washed through him like a flood.

***

On the eve of Une's wedding, Nichol sat in the garden and ate fruit until he became sick. Even the sweat-drenched relief in vomiting up the same did little to console his spirit. The vial of poison was already in his pocket. All he had to do was put the odorless liquid into the woman's marriage goblet and he would have saved her from her own mistakes.

Why could she not listen to reason? She served Treize better as his untouched right-hand. Being his wife forbade her from teaching, even if she wrote lessons anonymously she had limited her strongest influence.

Nichol thought he'd brought her to see his logic in their last conversation, when most unexpectedly a young man had interrupted their privacy.

"She doesn't love you," the stranger had said simply, as if he knew anything about them. Nichol had never seen him before. "And if you try to control her life, you are no better than Treize."

Une had watched, saying nothing as if in a daze.

Nichol had left in a furious temper, only to find a more conclusive argument than words. He would take action.

He rolled away from his mess and nearly embraced the base of the tree. His forehead pressed with a dull pain against an exposed root. Then he belatedly noticed a second person as a hand pushed his soaked curls away from his brow.

"Nichol, you have a terrifying passion—even for a mortal," a voice said. It sounded strangely like the boy who had thwarted his argument with Une. Nichol frowned but a feverish illness kept him from seeing clearly.

"Almost like _war_ ," the voice pondered. "What has our presence caused to happen?"

***

Nichol woke under the same tree, but the blue sky greeted him with warmth, the ground felt like a soft blanket and no sign of his madness from the day before remained in him. He reached for the bottle of poison, but found it missing. Had his plan been a dream? He felt as if he owed someone for his salvation.

No longer angry at Une, he wiped bitter, shame-filled tears from his eyes. What had he been intending to do? He was not like that at all. He stared at his hands remember the wicked plotting in the night. Then used them to pull himself upright with the tree as a support. He made himself look directly into the bright sky.

"I cannot trust myself," he bit his lip. "I must go far away…"

***

"Hang on, Heero. Don't you think that punishment is a little much, considering the crime?" Duo pushed in between his brothers, One and Three. They seldom met in one place, but when Wufei summoned each of them in turn--all five reunited in the place mortals call heaven.

"Aren't you going to say anything to defend yourself?" Quatre asked, nervously as he saw no easy way to quench the rush of anger toward Trowa.

"I love him," Trowa shrugged. "Nothing I say at this point would explain my actions in any way that you would understand." The other four watched him, listening and seeking to comprehend Trowa's behavior. Until that moment, Three had not spoken once after Wufei indicated what had been done.

Trowa had intervened and changed one man's entire destiny.

Heero's dark blue eyes flashed with the anger of a storm. "I know that these two fickle gods will heed prayer and provide relief in mortal affairs, but you… Trowa, from you I expected something better."

"You won't understand," Trowa smiled. "Soon, perhaps. But not now…"

"Are you saying you're smarter than us?" Duo crossed his arms, succumbing to indignation. His eyes matched Heero's raging only Duo's energy gave power the ocean's waves.

"At the least, he should not be allowed to travel the underground path," Wufei more reasonably suggested.

"Where will you live?" Quatre worried. "You could stay with me."

"And keep him away from that human," Heero's words were clipped. "If I knew this man's name I would eliminate the threat myself." But when he cast a look at Wufei, the god of the underworld remained as silent as the dead. Heero continued, "Perhaps I should wipe them all out and start over…"

"No, Heero, don't!" Quatre exclaimed, moments before Duo seemed likely to do the same.

Familiar with the nature of Two and Four, Heero rolled his eyes at them both. "Let this be a warning to all of you," he threatened. "Or I will send enough fire by lightning that you'll have to rebuild the waters and fields from the very smallest seeds of life."

***

And it was under Heero's curse that Trowa sat alone in the mortal tavern watching the soldiers. He knew that Nichol would have enlisted in the army after fleeing the near-completion of his premeditated crime.

Trowa's ears were prevented from hearing Nichol's name. His eyes could not see the man, but Trowa recognized Nichol's work. This unit of men had better kept equipment than any other battalion in the nation's military.

 _He is in war, but he is_ not _war,_ Trowa drank deeply in his relief.

***

The next meeting of the gods surprised Trowa. He had spent most of his time in the mortal world, edging as close as he could to the limits of his punishment. When he arrived in heaven, Heero was already waiting.

"Have I done something else to make you angry?" Trowa asked, completely unaware of what it might be--except that it did not take much to make Heero prickly.

"Not you," Heero said quietly. "But I blame you somewhat…"

"How so?" Trowa asked.

"I blame you, because I think you have kept knowledge from the rest of us. You have anticipated this… that in time we would…"

"Ah yes," Trowa nodded. "Time. It is my specialty, but not exactly as you think, brother."

"You have all of time, but you occupy it so narrowly," Heero did not exactly ask his question.

"I still love him," Trowa replied, knowing Heero's question all the same. "I may not be with him, but I prefer to stay as near to him as possible. Even if it means spending my energy in the briefest space of all Time."

Heero sighed. He had been pacing heaven, but then sat abruptly. He cradled his head in his hands as if he were a child. "I don't know what to do," Heero admitted. "Everything is changing."

"Is it?" Trowa didn't get to have his question answered because Two and Four arrived. Then just behind them, the black presence of the underworld as Wufei appeared. The dark-haired god did not step past the gate of heaven.

"Heero, we need to talk," Wufei said with fury. "Where did you take Mariemaia?"

"Who?" Duo asked. Then he saw Quatre's guilty expression and wrapped his arm around Four's shoulders. "What do you know?"

"You all conspire to be with mortals," Heero fumed from where he sat.

"Who is Mariemaia?" Duo interrupted.

"She is my wife," Wufei grumbled, but his words were quickly covered by Duo's manic laughter.

"A mortal?" Duo held his stomach from too much mirth.

"Don't tell me you have not considered it?" Wufei sneered. Their typically somber sibling crackled the air with his anger. "Return her to me."

"You may need to speak with Mariemaia about the arrangement," Quatre said quietly. "She was not completely taken against her will."

"Demigods," Trowa whispered. They would all know it soon enough. The balance of the five was about to crumble. "Who else is there? Who else?" he asked, more pointedly. He swung around to stare at One. "Even you. You too, Heero… you sense them now."

"Certain mortals are born with our power," Wufei acknowledged. "I only began to recognize this when I saw a pattern developing. Not long after you interfered with that one's destiny…"

"It would have happened even if I had done nothing." Trowa crossed his arms. "Mortals are more complicated than the first children we watched crawling around our world. They pray to harvest, they pray to the sun, they pray to war… and now they have ears to hear their petitions."

"These demigods will challenge us," Heero grumbled. "We should get rid of them before it starts. Tear them to pieces." He pointed at Trowa. "You should have done it as soon as you noticed… but instead...!"

"Perhaps you should climb down from the sky and meet them before you start ripping them to shreds," Trowa replied. Then a cross expression covered his features, "And if you so much as touch Nichol, I will avenge him with so much fury throughout all of Time…"

"Easy, Trowa," Quatre raised his hands as if surrendering for all of them. "Could you _give us_ time instead? To adjust?"

Instead of answering, Trowa looked at each of them in turn. "Release me from my punishment," he bargained. Soon enough, he noticed the restriction lifting until at last it was gone altogether.

"What about Mariemaia?" Wufei returned to his chief concern.

"Go," Heero stood then. "All of you. Do whatever you please, as you seem to be doing anyway. Leave me alone."

"Heero…" Quatre started, but Duo pulled him away.

"He'll figure it out," Duo reassured, confidently. "Did you know that mortals believe in a goddess of love? Now that's one demigod I want to track down!"

***

Time folded and threatened to rewrite itself in Trowa's reckless haste. He barely recognized the world as he let his feet walk the ground. Nichol was near. He knew that presence from a long study as the boy lived his mortal life. But now? Now they were almost peers. Did that mean Nichol would recognize Trowa as well?

Traffic on the eight lane road stopped as Trowa crossed between the now out-of-time vehicles. He saw a man mid-phrase singing along to the radio. A woman too busy on her phone to watch the road would case a fifteen car pile up in three seconds. Trowa took the device from her hand and put it in the backseat of her car instead. He repaired a deflating tire, healed a terminally ill child, and gave a woman the courage to testify in court.

A few yards from the car repair shop, Trowa saw one person outside of his control. Nichol slouched against the cinder-block wall as he methodically wiped grease from his tools.

"Took you long enough," Nichol muttered without looking up.

Trowa rubbed at the back of his neck and laughed once. "I felt like celebrating?"

Standing, Nichol closed the gap. "Do you even know what century this is? Worthless god of Time."

"Ah," Trowa grinned. "Who's counting?"


End file.
